Windows Vista

Windows Vista SP1 Released

windowsvistablog.com
"Microsoft has said that Windows Vista SP1 is released to manufacturing and it should become available on Windows Update and the download center mid March."

Service Pack 1 promises great progress in performance, reliability and compatibility. Copying files within a PC or across a network will be up to 50% faster.

In mid-March, Microsoft will release Windows Vista SP1 to Windows Update (in English, French, Spanish, German and Japanese) and to the download center on microsoft.com. Windows Update visitors can choose to install Service Pack 1. If Windows Update determines that the system has one of the drivers known to be problematic, then Windows Update will not offer SP1.

3GB Memory Limit?

Aparently 3GB is as much as you can have, with a Microsoft Windows system. There is an interesting acticle on MSDN.com, Why Windows Vista on your PC with 4GB RAM can only see 3GB - or less... which makes it sound like the hardware and software industry has completely cocked up with memory allocation. Intel-based computers are of course able to access 4GB and beyond, but for various 'reasons' it seems that Windows runs into problems. It's a very sad state of affairs.

Shockwave 10.2.0.023 Install Error

I've just been trying to upgrade Adobe Shockwave for my web browsers (IE7 and FireFox 2), and the installation for both fails with this cryptic message:

Could not load the DLL library c:\windows\system32\macromed\Shockwave10\gi.dll. The application has failed to start because its side-by-side configuration is incorrect. Please see the application event log for detail.

I've no idea what that means or how to go about fixing it. This is on a fully patched Vista Premium.

Clean-Install Vista from at an Upgrade Price

The upgrade price of Microsoft Windows Vista is much lower than the full retail price. What if you could install Vista from the Upgrade version, without having another version of Windows already? Well, you can... WindowsSecrets.com has the answer.

It's based on two key facts:

1. You can install an unactivated copy of Vista from the Upgrade disk
2. The Upgrade disk accepts an unactivated copy of Vista itself as evidence of a previous installation.

Doesn't make sense? Read the article and follow the eleven steps.

The author of the article, Brian Livingston, is editorial director of the Windows Secrets Newsletter and the co-author of Windows Vista Secrets and 10 other books.

Explorer misbehaving

I like to use the folder view to move around the drives and folders, so I'm always opening one folder on the left, closing it, opening another one, etc. Unfortunately, Vista is lacking here in three respects:

1. It has changed the old '+' and '-' symbols into minute black arrows that are very difficult to click on - because of their size. It's almost like you aren't supposed to click on them at all!
2. If you have one folder view open, then close it (by clicking on the black arrow) and click on another folder, the first folder re-opens. This can cause a lot of confusing repositioning.
3. When you open a folder by clicking on it, the folder view can change, ie, the folder you've just clicked on moves up or down in the folder view pane.

Used to Alt-Tabbing? Good luck!

If you regularly use Alt-Tab to switch between Windows, you're in for a shock with Vista. The display of windows is actually much improved - you can see a mini version of each window in real-time - but the relative positions of these windows change on a seemingly random basis. There seem to be window focussing issues: if another window grabs the focus while you're Alt-Tabbing, suddenly you're Alt-tabbing from that window instead. Very confusing if yo're just trying to hop in order between two or three windows, and a fourth windows rears its ugly head at the wrong moment.

Frustrating Privileges

Getting confused and frustrated with the Windows Vista Privileges? I discovered that (I think) you need to reboot after you change your security policy. You set your security policy in Administrative Tools:Local Security Policy, and my administrative-mode settings are like this:

Accounts: Administrator account status	Enabled
Accounts: Guest account status	Enabled
Accounts: Limit local account use of blank passwords to console logon only	Enabled
Accounts: Rename administrator account	Administrator
Accounts: Rename guest account	Guest
System objects: Require case insensitivity for non-Windows subsystems	Enabled
System objects: Strengthen default permissions of internal system objects (e.g. Symbolic Links)	Enabled
System settings: Optional subsystems	Posix
System settings: Use Certificate Rules on Windows Executables for Software Restriction Policies	Disabled
User Account Control: Admin Approval Mode for the Built-in Administrator account	Not Defined
User Account Control: Behavior of the elevation prompt for administrators in Admin Approval Mode	Prompt for consent
User Account Control: Behavior of the elevation prompt for standard users	Prompt for credentials
User Account Control: Detect application installations and prompt for elevation	Enabled
User Account Control: Only elevate executables that are signed and validated	Disabled
User Account Control: Run all administrators in Admin Approval Mode	Enabled
User Account Control: Switch to the secure desktop when prompting for elevation	Enabled

If you disable prompting for elevation, you will not get prompted, but yo will not get elevated privileges either!

AJAX in Vista

The IE Blog says that to have your cross-browser AJAX work better with IE7, you really should be invoking the native XMLHttpRequest (the cross-browser one) first to see if it’s available before instantiating the ActiveX control, instead of the other way around.

Apparently IE7 blocks ActiveX controls, so you need to use the cross-browser XMLHttpRequest to avoid those nasty bleeps.

Programming with the Vista Sidebar

I couldn't believe it when I saw this: Microsoft's Gadget Development Overview. A gadget is a useful mini-application on the desktop (in the sidebar, actually) and there are already gadgets for clocks, CPU meters, RSS feeds, etc. Sure enough, in these enlightened times, you can write your own and Microsoft talks about an SDK (Software Development Kit). Uhoh, methinks, this is going to be a C#/.NET exercise involving enormous projects. Well, actually the gadget is organised by XML and the interface can be good ol' HTML/Javascript. No compiling or development tools required! This is a total steal on the Firefox Mozilla extensions methodology, but what the heck? You can easily integrate whatever development you like straight into your desktop!